AUGUSTA CHRONICLE SYNDICATED EDITORIAL, ALBEIT SECULAR/POLITICAL, NAILS WHAT THE CURRENT CRISIS IN RELIGION IN SECULARIZED CULTURE IS: ORIGINAL SIN AND ITS ACTUAL MORTAL SIN COUNTERPART, THE DEADLY SIN OF PRIDE THAT MAKES MAN AND HIS DEFORMED CONSCIENCE INTO A gOD, A FALSE gOD OF COURSE WITH ITS SUBSEQUENT CONSEQUENCES SUCH AS ADAM AND EVE EXPERIENCED

What happens when man replaces God as God?

By Harold W. Pease, Ph.D.

When man denies the existence of God, or even believes himself an agnostic he, in effect, replaces God with himself as the highest entity of intelligence. This affects his political thinking in virtually every way.

If God does not exist then he cannot be counted on to manage the planet, thus puny man must. Without faith that God oversees everything for the benefit of man the following could not be understood: the rotation of the planets, sunsets and sunrises, the consistency of gravity, wind speeds and temperature variances — even oxygen levels. Nor could the precarious balances of nature that allows a million species of plant and animal life to cohabitate simultaneously on this earth, to eat and be eaten and still survive, every hour of every single day with little overall difference from decade to decade. If the sun refused to rise man would die in a few days, so dependent are we on an intelligence far above our own.

Without faith, man would have believed in, and been frightened by, global cooling in the 1970s, global warming in the 1990s, and climate change in the 2010s and be totally mystified as to why everyone else wasn’t as subject to manmade predictions and panicked as he. They must not be as intelligent. He could never have peace that God had everything under control.

If man has replaced God as God he would find himself panicked over the ever-expanding population. He would look at food availability and compare it to the birth rate, as man has for thousands of years, and conclude that we have to cut the birthrate or we will eventually starve. He would not see that God feeds even the birds who do nothing for it. He would never concede that God would enable man to invent a plow, a tractor, or a combine to increase the food supply and trucks, boats and planes to move it about.

If man has replaced God as God he would tend to favor a regimental form of government such as socialism so that he could make everyone else do as he supposed was best for them. He would never allow natural law where each decide for themselves what is best for them, amplifying incentive, and in such the whole society is benefited. No, never! It would be too dangerous left without total control. Even thought, if possible, must be managed and cameras and drones placed everywhere to see that it is. Freedom dies.

If man has replaced God as God he would credit himself with his success, money, inventions and power. Thus he expects dominion over others because these things, in his mind, demonstrate his superiority.

If man has replaced God as God there could be no ultimate moral authority, translated — no evil, thus no sin, no justice, and no heaven or hell. No security of rights or property would exist. Man justifies his actions with whatever logic suits him — “might is right” has been a consistent philosophy of human existence in societies without God. Man exists only until his death, just like all life. No afterlife with friends and associates or loved ones. No reward or punishment. No sanctity of life thus abortion, infanticide and euthanasia are practiced because their space benefits those living. The weak and vulnerable are cast aside or extinguished.

If man has replaced God as God he might also feel it necessary to compete with God for authority and dominion. Jews lay claim to having been the most persecuted race on the globe the past 2,000 years, being decimated in the gas chambers of Hitler’s Third Reich. Christians were fed to the lions in Roman coliseum’s for entertainment in their early centuries under Roman authority. Today they are the most widely persecuted religion, especially in the Middle East and Africa. Muslims are the most persecuted religion in China with at least a million Uighurs, incarcerated in slave labor camps for their religion, also serving as organ donors on demand for the western world.

When man doesn’t need God he does not seek Him, consequently prayer, inspiration and revelation also are largely muted. Creativity diminishes. Nor is faith needed or nurtured. Man becomes more basal in language and carnal in behavior, less distinguishable from animal behavior. Refinement properties like sharing, giving, sacrificing for others, forgiving others are dulled or extinguished. Darkness is allowed to dim the light of Christ. With diminished light judgment, even the ability to reason, is impaired. Isn’t that what happened, by-in-large, during the so-called Dark Ages when there was little change in Europe for hundreds of years?

If man has replaced God as God he also tends to replace Lucifer as Lucifer. Ironically he denies the existence of both, even failing to recognize what he has become because he left God out. Isn’t this what happened in socialist societies under Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Castro, Pol Pot and so many others? Although these examples are extreme isn’t this legacy, to some degree, common to philosophies or individuals who allowed themselves to replace God as God?

The best evidence that man is not God, and that God exists, is that man as God would have self-destructed thousands of years ago. He has difficulty managing himself, let alone the planet and the universe.

The writer is a syndicated columnist and an expert on the U.S. Constitution. He has dedicated his career to studying the writings of the Founding Fathers and applying that knowledge to current events. He taught history and political science from this perspective for more than 30 years at Taft College in California.